King Eric and the Outlaws, Vol. 2

by Bernhard Severin Ingemann

  CHAP. VIII.

  When the two powerful and well-known knights, Niels Brock and JohanPapae, with their outlawed friend between them, and the anxious SirPalle at their side, rode with their train through the gates ofWordingborg, there was so much bustle among the gathering crowd in thetown that they were scarcely noticed. The king had arrived with hisbrother the junker and his numerous train of knights--Drost Aage, MarskOluffsen, Count Henrik of Mecklenborg, and nearly all his mostimportant councillors were with him. The castle was filled withprincely guests and their splendid trains. Duke Valdemar of Slesvig,and his brother the gigantic Duke Eric of Langeland, had just madetheir entry into the castle, and there was much talk among the populaceof the long legs of Duke Eric, of which none had ever seen the like.

  "'Tis a devil of a fellow, yon long-shanks," said the sentinel at thecastle gate to his comrade. "'Twas surely he who slew Drost Skelm inNyborg just under the king's nose."

  "No, comrade, he slew him in his bed; I know that better," answered theother man-at-arms. "I was myself among the king's spear-men at theDanish court: it will be just four years come next Lady-day; the heatwas great, and they drank hard at court--the long-legged lord is fiercewhen he is hot in the head or drunk; and at that time, sure enough, hesided with the outlaws. Had the king been present, long-shanks wouldscarcely have ventured on so rough a jest--he was forced to flee fromNyborg the same night, and for three years he durst not show his facebefore the king. For all that he is a very able fellow," continued theman-at-arms; "and since he got a dressing at Gronsund he hath learnedto take off his hat to our king. However fierce and mad he may be, heis nevertheless a hundred times honester than his wizened brother, theyellow scarecrow from Slesvig."

  The talk now turned upon this generally unpopular prince. It was knownthat the ambitious and wily Duke Valdemar had aspired to the Danishcrown, and been suspected of a secret understanding with Marsk Stig andthe outlaws. Since the great sea-fight at Gronsund, his proud spirithad drooped, however; his last conspiracy and contumacy against hisliege sovereign resembled the flaring up of a burnt-out and exhaustedvolcano. The duke's sallow, withered visage and long nose were thesubjects of the coarse jests and biting comments of the populace,although his well-known acuteness, and sagacious state-policy stillappeared to be dreaded.

  The king's step-father. Count Gerhard of Holstein, or the one-eyedcount, as he was called by the people, was, on the contrary, muchlauded. Since his marriage with Queen Agnes he often sojourned at thecastle of Nykioeping. He had on this day arrived from Falster, to act ascounsellor and mediator in the treaty with the Dukes. Much reliance wasplaced on his uprightness and wisdom, and his frank and joyousdeportment gained him general favour.

  Every hour brought new arrivals to the town and castle, and among themwere seen many venerable prelates and bishops known to be devoted tothe king. Among others, the Bishops of Aarhuus and Ribe, and theprovincial Prior of the Dominicans, the venerable Master Olaus, whostood at the head of the Danish clergy's appeal to the pope against theenforcement of the interdict according to the constitution of Veile.This estimable and truly patriotic prelate, with his mild, calm, agedface, and snowy ring of hair around his tonsure, was almost worshippedby the people, and wherever he appeared it was whispered that it was hewho would deliver the country from ban and interdict.

  Every traveller who announced himself to the Marsk as the king'svassal, or belonging to Danish knighthood, was instantly assigned aplace in the large upper story of the castle appropriated to the use ofthe knights. The spacious apartments in this side wing were, however,nearly all occupied, when Sir Niels Brock and Sir Johan Papae announcedthemselves to the Marsk, with their unknown friend, whom they gave outto be Sir Ako Blackbeard of the renowned race of Krummedige. He hadreturned home from a pilgrimage, it was said, and had vowed silence atthe holy grave, and bound himself not to lay aside the armour of hisancestor until the knight's vow was fulfilled which he had there madeto the Lord. Such vows were then not uncommon. They met with readyapprobation, and carried with them a claim to special honour, and aspecies of religious reverence. As the king's vassals, and Danishknights of some consideration, the three travellers likewise were nowadmitted at the castle. Sir Palle had separated from them as soon aspossible, and announced their arrival to his master the junker,without, however, mentioning the suspicious guest they had brought withthem. Disquieted by this secret, he went from one party to another,feeling, as it were, that he carried his life in his hand. He was seen,now among the king's, now among the junker's friends, where, withassumed eagerness, he adopted the prevailing tone of the company he wasin. He presently, however, rejoined Brock and other haughty andindependent knights, who spake freely and boldly both against the kingand the junker, and whom he desired not to offend, nor to be despisedby, for servile or timid conduct. He thus thought to secure his safetyunder all circumstances; but he considered no party as perfectly safe,and could not determine in what manner he might best avail himself ofthe important discovery he had made while in the great lime-tree in thecourt of the forest monastery.

  Notwithstanding the stir which was necessarily caused by the presenceof so many strangers in the castle and the town, a remarkable stillnessprevailed, and a stern seriousness pervaded the assemblage at thecastle. There were no public amusements. The king only appeared atmattins and mass, and at table, noon and evening, in the great upperhall, where were placed two long dining-tables--one for the king andhis princely guests, as well as for the prelates and chief men of thestate, and another for the Danish knights in general, and the guestswho had joined them. Among them sat the mysterious personage from theforest monastery, between Sir Niels Brock and Sir Johan Papae. Accordingto his knight's vow, the pretended Sir Ako kept on his helmet as wellas the old-fashioned armour, and his silence and solemn deportment wereregarded with respect. At the same table sat the knights and courtiersof the duke's train, with the German professors of minstrelsy and otherlearned and foreign visitors. When the noontide repast was over, thecompany dispersed. Some remained in the spacious apartments of thecastle, where they amused themselves with chess and backgammon, orlistened to the German minstrels' lays and tales of chivalry;others went to the tennis-court, or the riding-house, and thegreat tilting-yard, where they whiled away the time with tennis,horse-racing, and martial exercises; some parties went a hawking in thechase, or rode through the town in order to show themselves in alltheir splendour to the ladies of the place. Many were interested insurveying the royal fleet which lay in the harbour, while others tookthe opportunity of bargaining with the Hanseatic merchants andskippers, or of making purchases of the famous Wordingborg cloth,which, next to that of Ypres and Ghent, was in especial demand, andbore as high a price as that of Bruges. In the evening the sound oflutes and love ditties was heard, as well in the castle as in the town,where the youthful knights were in search of acquaintance and loveadventures.

  The important negociations with the dukes appeared for the first fewdays, entirely to occupy the king and his council. Through themediation of Count Gerhard, a peace was soon concluded, and on the mosthonourable terms for the king. A herald then summoned the knights andguests together in the great knights' hall of the castle. Here the kingwas seated on a raised throne, between his brother the junker and CountGerhard, surrounded by the dukes and all his vassals, as well as thestate council, and the prelates present at the castle. The Drost readaloud the ratified treaty of peace, in which Duke Valdemar pledgedhimself that no injustice should be done to the king's peasants in thedukedom, and also scrupulously to perform his duties of vassalage tothe Danish crown. On these terms the king consented to pardon him andhis brother as well as every one who had sided with the duke in thisfeud, with the stern exception, however, that henceforth every knightand squire who had been proved to have taken part in his father'smurder should be doomed to death wherever they should be found.

  While this article of the treaty was read, the king looked around theassemblage with a severe
and what seemed to many, a threatening glance.There were not a few present of the acknowledged friends and kinsmen ofthe outlaws, and in the train of the Duke of Slesvig were severalpersons unknown both to the Marsk and the Drost, who had excitedsuspicion by their mysterious and unruly deportment. This strict clausein the treaty appeared greatly to disappoint the expectations of theDuke's friends, and their confidence in this politic prince. He himselfsat with downcast eyes, and vainly strove to assume an air of calmindifference.

  The Drost finished the reading of the treaty, which excited greatattention, and awakened interest of very different kinds, without asingle sound being heard in the numerous and anxious assembly. Theconcluding article however seemed in some degree to soften the sternvictor-like tone, which characterised the treaty. By a just recognitionof the rights of his brave opponent, the king had invested Duke Eric ofLangeland with the fiefs of Oe and of Alt, which he was entitled todemand in right of his consort Sophia's inheritance. This articleterminated the essential part of the treaty, and the assemblage brokeup.

  Count Gerhard still purposed remaining some days longer, and the Dukeof Langeland, who was especially pleased with the king's uprightness,and with the whole treaty, also remained; but his brother the Duke ofSlesvig immediately quitted the castle with his whole retinue. He leftWordingborg with his hat slouched low over his eyes, apparentlydepressed and humbled to a degree which he had never before manifested.He was escorted part of the way by Junker Christopher, who on thisoccasion seemed desirous to surpass the king in generous sympathy andattentions towards this fallen aspirant to the throne of Denmark, whoowed his downfall to his own rancorous animosity and deluded ambition.Sir Niels Brock and Sir John Papae, who appeared to seize everyopportunity of approaching the junker without exciting remark, hadjoined his train.

  It was not until late in the evening that Prince Christopher returned.He had sent Papae with the rest of his train on before, and arrived awhole hour later in the town, accompanied by Brock. They rode slowlyalong the dusky road, and conversed in a low tone, and at intervals,together. They found the town lighted up with flambeaux and torches, onoccasion of the ratification of the treaty. Songs and merry lutesresounded from several houses. At the castle, the knight's hall wasilluminated; music and song was also to be heard there. Workmen werebusied at the lists by the light of lanterns; and carpenters wereemployed in erecting railings and a high stand for the next day'stournament, in which the king himself intended taking a part.

  "Ay! he will never tire of this child's play," muttered JunkerChristopher, after he had rode past the lists and had seen thesepreparations; "he squanders more on such nonsense in a year, than bothSamsoe and Kallundborg bring me in; he ruins the country with it, andwill at last break his own neck in this foolery."

  "His courtiers are too polite and obsequious for that," answeredBrock--"there is assuredly not one among his strutting halberdiers, orknights of the round table, who would not willingly let himself bepushed out of his saddle ten times a day, to please his chivalrousmaster. Credit me, they have regularly exercised themselves in the artof kicking up their heels in the air, as soon as he touches them withhis lance.

  "They would be badly paid for such courtesy, did they venture on it,"answered the junker. "After the most trifling tilt, a strict knights'council is held; and he pays almost more attention to those mockfights, regulated by all the foreign laws and rules of honour, than tothe manners and morals of his subjects."

  "Doth he also mix with stranger-knights and masters of arms on suchoccasions?" asked Brock. It is the first time of my attending this kindof entertainment.

  "Oh yes!" muttered the junker, "when his vanity may be flattered, hedespises no laurels. Hitherto he hath really passed for an invincibleking Arthur."

  "Perhaps he may meet with his overmatch, nevertheless," said Brock in alowered tone, and looking cautiously around him. "I never fight forsport myself; but give heed to-morrow, high-born junker--Know you theancient tradition of the puling enamoured demi-god Baldur, and the boldHother?"[4]

  "How mean ye?" asked the junker, stalling.----

  "I have a good friend,--I know of a foreign knight I would say--amaster of his weapon, who in such courteous game might have a mind toplay Hother."

  "Ay! indeed!" muttered Christopher, looking uneasily around,--"youshould caution your friend, though, against playing so dangerous agame; you should least of all speak to me, Sir Brock, of such friendsand their wishes. What I have confided to you, in no wise warrants suchpresumptuous confidence. Whatever there may be between me and a certainmighty personage, matters will hardly be pushed so far as you and yourbold friends think."

  "Be pleased to understand me aright, high-born junker," interrupted SirNiels hastily. "I speak but of a sport; I know they amuse themselveshere at times with mumming, and such diversions."

  "They may amuse themselves as they please, for aught I care," mutteredthe junker, gloomily; "but I will be out of the game. Half one's lifeis but a sorry piece of mumming, whether we play friend or foe. It willbe seen who hath best enacted his part, when the childs' play here isended, and people think in earnest again in Denmark. He then spurredhis horse, and rode into the court of the castle.

  "After the junker and Brock had dismounted from their horses in thecastle-yard, and as they were passing the maidens' tower, they heardthe sound of a lute, and saw a knightly figure hastily conceal himselfbehind the pillars of the tower."

  "Hath every one gone mad? Serenades here in the country, and that evenere the nightingale hath come!" muttered the junker with a scornfullaugh, and wrapping himself in his mantle to keep out the cold wind."Hum! as is the master so are his servants--are we not far advancedhere in courtesy, and gentle customs Sir Niels! Know ye ought of suchgallantry in Jutland? All will now go on in as chivalrous a fashion asin Spain and Italy. That we may thank these vagabond minstrels for,with their ballads and their books of adventures, which my chivalrousbrother even takes with him in his pocket, on his campaigns. In theknights' hall there, they are now talking, no doubt, of the beautifulFlorez and Blantzeflor, and of the virtuous Tristan and King Arthur.All that is indispensable if one would pass for a courteous and courtlyknight;--and without, here, wanders a fool to sing serenades in themoonlight, to the owls of Wordingborg tower."

  "If that was a prison we passed. Sir Junker," observed his companion,"it might be easily explained without such players' tricks."

  "Well possibly," said the junker nodding. "It was here the Drost tookthe liberty of caging Marsk Stig's raven brood instead of atKallundborg. Even the pretty vagabond ladies we shall find have theiradorers." The junker then ascended the stairs of the balcony.